Building a Personal Brand on Social Media

In our social media-driven world, your online presence can have
lasting impacts on your business, career, and everyday life. So,
how do you build and
manage an effective personal brand on social media that keeps
you moving in the right direction?

We posed this question and others to social media practitioners
in a recent
#SprinklrChat Twitter conversation. Participants shared their
tips for
establishing a personal brand and described what motivates and
inspires their posts. Here were some of the most interesting
takeaways from the chat.

LinkedIn is Important, and Deserves More Attention

Across the board, chat participants expressed a desire to
get more active on LinkedIn. The network has evolved from job
board, to networking site, to newsroom. Users have many reasons for
logging in, posting updates, and building new connections.

A2: Post more on LinkedIn! Building my
LinkedIn presence has been a New Years resolution of mine for a few
years running, but I never really got the ball rolling. I want to
get more invested in the professional world/news in 2019!
#SprinklrChatpic.twitter.com/rtbz6i7nZ0

#SprinklrChat
A7:As a recruiter, and for most functional searches, I stick with
LI. Will say, that over the past couple of years, the lines have
been blended between personal and professional channels. In truth,
each individual owns, what they want and how they want to
share.

But be careful what you post! People are interested in LinkedIn
content that provides value, so keep things positive and
professional for the best results.

A5: I’ve been seeing more & more
questionable content shared by my Linkedin network
It’s one thing to share personal stories and lessons from your
career, but in my opinion, Linkedin is not the place to share tales
from your love life or your life problems.
#SprinklrChatpic.twitter.com/4LsAyrybPZ

A5: How personal is too personal on any
social channel? One of my personal values is INTEGRITY which means
that all aspects of my life should be appropriate and aligned to
each other. As @zachmerrill5
proposed, it’s more about intention of content.
#SprinklrChat

A6: Be consistent, be authentic, and be
interesting! Posting frequently is key to becoming friends with
most platform algorithms
Pair that with interesting and genuine content, and your followers
are sure to go up!
#SprinklrChat

Your
personal brand on social media is (or should be) an extension
of who you are in the real world, but each network may show a
different part of the overall picture. Certain profiles might be
more business-friendly, while others are more personal. This
doesn’t mean that any profile is more or less “real” than
another, just that the messaging is tailored for different
audiences.

Using a scale of 1-10, we asked participants how comfortable
they would be if recruiters used their profiles as a resume. The
answers varied quite a bit, though most acknowledged the unique
roles of each platform in their personal branding.

A7: 6 out of 10. LinkedIn and Twitter are
100% professional but Facebook and Instagram are personal profiles
(and have privacy set accordingly!!)
#SprinklrChat

A7: 10. My LinkedIn and Twitter show my
professional interests, thought leadership, and expertise. My
Instagram shows my personal interests, hobbies, and passions. All
three complement my resume to showcase who I am as a person
professionally and personally.
#SprinklrChat

A7: I’d say around a 3. While I having
nothing to hide on my personal social accounts, I mostly use them
for vacation photos so it doesn’t accurately portray my
professional interests. One of my New Years resolutions is to blend
both for my personal brand!
#SprinklrChatpic.twitter.com/BgJWzqKUme

We all have different reasons for maintaining our social media
accounts. Think about your goals and how your
online persona(s) can help you reach them. Who do you want to
get seen by, and what do you want people to see?

Even if you have different objectives for each account, they
should all be accurate representations of who you are. Think of a
few words to describe your personal brand, and make sure those
traits are expressed across your entire presence. Remember,
authenticity rules!